Practical Homeschooling » activity ideas

Free Printable Islamic Coloring Pages

Laura — Tue, 23 Aug 2011 23:20:22 +0000

If you’re looking for resources to teach your children about and Islam (we are nearing the end of the holy month of Ramadan), I have a page on Squidoo full of coloring pages on numerous topics in the religion of Islam.

For Islamic coloring pages, click here.

The Ultimate Reading List: 100 Books For Your Older Children To Read

Laura — Thu, 06 Jan 2011 12:16:01 +0000

I found this reading list circulating around Facebook. It has an excellent mix of old and new literature that provides people a good grounding of our Western culture. How many of these books have you read? I challenge you, and your families, to read all the books on this list. Who will be the first to complete this challenge?

1- Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austen
2- The Lord of the Rings – JRR Tolkien
3- Jane Eyre – Charlotte Bronte
4- Harry Potter series – JK Rowling
5- To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee
6- The Bible
7- Wuthering Heights – Emily Bronte
8- Nineteen Eighty Four – George Orwell
9- His Dark Materials trilogy – Philip Pullman
10- Great Expectations – Charles Dickens

11- Little Women – Louisa M Alcott
12- Tess of the D’Urbervilles – Thomas Hardy
13- Catch 22 – Joseph Heller
14- Complete Works of Shakespeare
15- Rebecca – Daphne Du Maurier
16- The Hobbit – JRR Tolkien
17- Birdsong – Sebastian Faulk
18- The Catcher in the Rye – JD Salinger
19- The Time Traveler’s Wife – Audrey Niffenegger
20- Middlemarch – George Eliot

21- Gone With The Wind – Margaret Mitchell
22- The Great Gatsby – F Scott Fitzgerald
24- War and Peace – Leo Tolstoy
25- The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy – Douglas Adams
26- Brideshead Revisited – Evelyn Waugh
27- Crime and Punishment – Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28- Grapes of Wrath – John Steinbeck
29- Alice in Wonderland – Lewis Carroll
30- The Wind in the Willows – Kenneth Grahame

31- Anna Karenina – Leo Tolstoy
32- David Copperfield – Charles Dickens
33- Chronicles of Narnia series – CS Lewis
34- Emma -Jane Austen
35- Persuasion – Jane Austen
36- The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe – CS Lewis
37- The Kite Runner – Khaled Hosseini
38- Captain Corelli’s Mandolin – Louis De Bernieres
39- Memoirs of a Geisha – Arthur Golden
40- Winnie the Pooh – A.A. Milne

41- Animal Farm – George Orwell
42- The Da Vinci Code – Dan Brown
43- One Hundred Years of Solitude – Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44- A Prayer for Owen Meaney – John Irving
45- The Woman in White – Wilkie Collins
46- Anne of Green Gables – LM Montgomery
47- Far From The Madding Crowd – Thomas Hardy
48- The Handmaid’s Tale – Margaret Atwood
49- Lord of the Flies – William Golding
50- Atonement – Ian McEwan

51- Life of Pi – Yann Martel
52- Dune – Frank Herbert
53- Cold Comfort Farm – Stella Gibbons
54- Sense and Sensibility – Jane Austen
55- A Suitable Boy – Vikram Seth
56- The Shadow of the Wind – Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57- A Tale Of Two Cities – Charles Dickens
58- Brave New World – Aldous Huxley
59- The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time – Mark Haddon
60- Love In The Time Of Cholera – Gabriel Garcia Marquez

61- Of Mice and Men – John Steinbeck
62- Lolita – Vladimir Nabokov
63- The Secret History – Donna Tartt
64- The Lovely Bones – Alice Sebold
65- The Count of Monte Cristo – Alexandre Dumas
66- On The Road – Jack Kerouac
67- Jude the Obscure – Thomas Hardy
68- Bridget Jones’s Diary – Helen Fielding
69- Midnight’s Children – Salman Rushdie
70- Moby Dick – Herman Melville

71- Oliver Twist – Charles Dickens
72- Dracula – Bram Stoker
73- The Secret Garden – Frances Hodgson Burnett
74- Notes From A Small Island – Bill Bryson
75- Ulysses – James Joyce
76- The Inferno – Dante
77- Swallows and Amazons – Arthur Ransome
78- Germinal – Emile Zola
79- Vanity Fair – William Makepeace Thackeray
80- Possession – AS Byatt

81- A Christmas Carol – Charles Dickens
82- Cloud Atlas – David Mitchell
83- The Color Purple – Alice Walker
84- The Remains of the Day – Kazuo Ishiguro
85- Madame Bovary – Gustave Flaubert
86- A Fine Balance – Rohinton Mistry
87- Charlotte’s Web – E.B. White
88- The Five People You Meet In Heaven – Mitch Albom
89- Adventures of Sherlock Holmes – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90- The Faraway Tree Collection – Enid Blyton

91- Heart of Darkness – Joseph Conrad
92- The Little Prince – Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93- The Wasp Factory – Iain Banks
94- Watership Down – Richard Adams
95- A Confederacy of Dunces – John Kennedy Toole
96- A Town Like Alice – Nevil Shute
97- The Three Musketeers – Alexandre Dumas
98- Hamlet – William Shakespeare
99- Charlie and the Chocolate Factory – Roald Dahl
100- Les Miserables – Victor Hugo

Easy Origami #1

Laura — Wed, 05 Jan 2011 12:00:07 +0000

Building origami used to be one of my most passionate pastimes. The sheer possibilities of what you can do with a simple pieceof paper simply amazes me. This image to the right is the Black Forest cuckoo clock designed by Robert Lang.it is folded from a single sheet of paper with a ratio of 1 to 10.

While it takes many years of learning and tons of experience to get to this level, children as young as three years old can learn to make very simple origami projects, like the ones in this post.

We will be building three simple pieces in this post.

a butterfly
doggie head
a samurai hat

Butterfly

Use one square sheet of paper. Turn over so that the colored site is down.

Fold in half along the diagonal.

Fold again in half.

Fold back first thing.

Fold back second wing.

Your completed butterfly. Now it's time to decorate it.

If you press down on the part that I highlighted in blue, you will find that it looks like it flies.

Doggie Head

Place one square sheet of paper on the table, colored side down.

Fold paper in half along the diagonal.

Fold again in half, then unfold.

Fold down the years.

Fold back the top and bottom parts.

Decorate the face, then it's complete!

Samurai Hat (Kabuto)

Begin with a square sheet of paper.

Turn the page over so that the colored site is down on the table

Fold in half along the diagonal.

Fold again in half.

Unfold.

Fold down one corner to the center line.

Do the same with the other side.

Fold up the corners.

Make the wings by folding the points towards the outside.

Take a single layer from the bottom, and folded upwards leaving about one quarter of the top showing.

Fold up the excess paper.

Flip over the hat.

Fold up the back piece.

Your hat is done!

21 Ways To Enjoy Winter

Laura — Tue, 04 Jan 2011 12:00:19 +0000

Winter is a season where life tends to slow down, and we enter a kind of pseudo-hibernation where we, too, slow down and become more sedentary. It’s time to embrace our slow season and make the best of it. Here are 21 activity ideas, for both indoors and out, to keep your families busy.

1. Animal Tracking

For those of you who get snow, winter is an excellent time to find animal tracks and to follow them. Take pictures of the tracks you find and then use the Internet or books from the library to figure out which animals made which tracks.

A Massachusetts Scouting Website contains A Pocket Guide To Massachusetts Animal Tracks (you will need to scroll down the page), which has a good listing of animals common to North America and the tracks they make. Recommended Books:
Big Tracks, Little Tracks: following animal prints
Tracks, Scats & Signs

2. Sledding

I have great memories of sliding down the hills behind my home on a magic carpet. I am sure that most of you can remember the exhilaration and excitement of tearing down those memorable slopes. Find the slides, or make one, and go find a snow-covered hill to throw yourself down.

3. Skiing

Downhill skiing, cross-country skiing and snowboarding are all excellent physical activities that will offer your child an exhilarating adventure. For those of you living in the city, local parks offer a great place to explore cross-country skiing.

4. Stargazing

Crisp winter nights are an excellent time to go stargazing with your family. Gather some blankets, some firewood for a campfire, and find a location away from civilization to be able to sit back and gaze at the stars.

Winter Stargazing Tips & Tricks
Naked Eye Stargazing

5. Feed The Birds

Setting up a bird feeder and providing food for the birds, helps him during a difficult winter months and enables your children to observe them from a close distance. An important word of warning though, if you start feeding them, you need to be consistent. The birds will become dependent upon your goodwill and suddenly removing their source of food can put their lives in danger.

Making bird feeders:
Bird Feeder Projects
How To Make Bird Feeders With Your Kids’ Help

Bird feed:
Dinner? It’s For The Birds
How To Make Bird Snacks

6. Building Snowshoes

Building snowshoes was a practice of nomadic tribes which were used to travel through deep snow with less effort. In fact, until the advent of modern transport, such as cars and skidoos, snowshoes were quite common. This activity is better suited for teens.

How To Make Snowshoes
How To Make Snowshoes And Use Them
Here’s How To Build Snowshoes

7. Make Snow People

Why stick to making the regular snowman? When it comes to sculpting with snow, the world is your oyster, and there is no limit to what you can create. How about building an entire family out of snow? How about an ogre? A gigantic alien?

Snow Sculptures
International Snow Sculpture Championships
Snow Sculpture Gallery

8. Build a Snow Fort

Building snow forts and then using them for snowball fights is a true right of passage. See what kind of fort you can come up with as a family.

Images Of Snow Forts
Snow Fort

9. Make A Giving Tree

A giving tree is a great way to encourage children to focus on the act of giving instead of receiving. A Christmas tree is set up with wishes from needy children.

How to make a holiday giving tree.

How to create giving tree at Christmas in classroom.

10. Learn About Winter Solstice

“The winter solstice occurs exactly when the Earth’s axial tilt is farthest away from the sun at its maximum of 23° 26′. More evident to those in high latitudes, this occurs on the shortest day and longest night of the year, when the sun’s daily maximum position in the sky is the lowest.”

Many cultures have revered this day because of its significance in the annual calendar. For many, for home winter was a difficult time for survival, this day meant a change from shortening days to days that would now start to gradually lengthened towards summer.

Winter Solstice celebrations
Build your own Stonehenge activity.

11. Snow Painting

Some individuals in our homeschooling community have taken this up as a family activity. All you need is a few squirt bottles and different colors of food dye. Fill each squirt bottle with water and add a few drops of food coloring.you are now ready to go. Dress up warmly and head outside with your bottles. Find a spot of undisturbed snow and using the squirt bottles ‘paint’ to your hearts content.

12. Build a winter survival shelter

Types of snow shelters
Field Manual for the US Antartic program (pdf)

13. Hot Chocolate/Apple Cider Stand

This is a great activity idea to do during the holidays in order to provide a little warmth to friends and neighbors. Very simply, set out a small table on the sidewalk at the front of your home with the thermos of hot chocolate or apple cider. Have some disposable cups available and offer a warm cup of drink to those passing by. No need to charge them anything, You can sure they will appreciate the gesture.

14. Visit Your Local Library

On the colder days when playing outside is not such a good idea, take a visit to the local library and explore the treasures it holds.

15. Have A Winter-Themed Movie Marathon

With winter nights so long, and the days so short, enjoy the early evenings with the selection of winter-themed movies. My personal favorite is The Dog Who Stopped The War, which I often watched as a child.

The best winter movies for kids

16. Indoor Snowball Fight

Save up an unwanted scraps throughout the year. Divide your children into two separate teams on the opposite sides of the room. Divide the available paper between them, and have them scrunch it sheet into a ball. When the “snowballs” are ready, they can now have their own snowball war. When the balls are all gone, collect them again and play again. Once you are done, either gather the balls up into a bag for another time, or recycle them.

17. Go Skating

Depending on where you live, skating is an excellent outdoor winter activity. If you’re fortunate enough to live near a pond, clear it off for a great skating surface. Of course, make sure first of all that the ice is thick enough to skate on. If you are in a more populated area, many communities have skating surfaces available in the winter.

18. Outdoor Exploration

Let your children go outside and explore even if the weather is frightful. Make sure that first of all, they are properly dressed, then let them loose outside. if you need in courage meant to stay engaged, have them try out fun activities such as who can bounce a ball in the rain the longest, make the most snow angels or build the biggest fort.

How many animals can they find going about outside? Do winter flowers grown your area? Can they find any?

19. Go Trekking

In a park or the local woods, have a parent take a walk through the snow, in and around trees, stones, brooks etc. A short time later, I love the kids( either supervised or unsupervised, depending on their age) follow the path that was left by that parent. Perhaps you would like to leave a little treasure at the end of the track as a reward. As the children become more proficient in this, try to make it harder to find your tracks.

20. Build An Indoor Fort

Blankets, tables, sofas and cushions for all you really need to build an indoor fort. Be creative. EZ Fort is an awesome new kit consisting of rods ant joints which allow your children to build the fort, then drape a sheet or blanket in order to complete it.

21. Build A Dream Catcher

Dream catchers originated in the Ojibwa nation. Some consider the dream catcher a symbol of unity among the various Indian Nations, and a general symbol of identification with Native American or First Nations cultures.

Dream catchers can be made either from a kit or from scratch.

Understanding the dreamcatcher legend

Yahtzee

Laura — Mon, 03 Jan 2011 12:00:57 +0000

Yahtzee anyone?

This is one game which, as a child, I spent many hours playing. Be it with my best friends or alone, I loved to fill the boxes of the gamesheet with the best rolls possible. Now that my daughters are getting older, I am starting to introduce this game to them as a way to practice their counting and deduction skills.

To play it is very simple. You need five dice, a cup and a game sheet. These game sheets can either be purchased in a store or online, or you can download and print a copy here .

For a complete set of rules and how to use the scorecards,visit Yahtzee’s UK website.

If you prefer to buy the entire game online, you may do so here. Do you play Yahtzee with your children?